The Lancre Caper, or The Perils of OverConfidence
by A.A. Pessimal
Summary: In which Assassins' School teacher Alice Band talks to her class on the dangers to the Assassin of over-confidence. In her case, practicing archaeology in Lancre.
1. Chapter 1

_**The Lancre Caper**_

_In which Alice Band, stealth archaeologist, learns why it is not wise to go anywhere near Lancre with a pick and shovel. _

There was the usual rumbling chaos as the pupils entered the classroom, fanning out and occupying desks according to the time-honoured principles of peer groups sitting together, swots up the front, rowdies right at the back, and those content to be anonymously in the middle of the pecking order inobtrusively settling into the middle seats.

Leaning on the teacher's desk at the front, Alice Band reflected that at the Assassins' School, some things were universal and could be expected at any educational establishment anywhere. She reflected that one important aspect of this school was that almost _nobody_ dared cheek the teacher: it was, she considered, a built-in expectation. She was better-armed than most of the pupils, for one thing. And they knew it.

Pushing her glasses up her nose, Alice allowed a couple of seconds for the class to settle, then stood up straight. Thirty student Assassins followed her, expectantly.

"Archaeology." she said. " Definitions, please. You, miss Tartiflette."

A mean trick, but indispensable: pick on the kid who isn't concentrating, or obviously staring out of the window, and put them on the spot. That one pupil will hate you for it, but it serves to focus the minds of the other twenty-nine admirably.

Thirteen-year old Olivia Tartiflette, 3R, gulped and tried to wing it.

"Digging old things up, miss?"

"Digging old things up. Digging old things up" Alice repeated. She ducked down behind the desk and came up holding a shovel, which she threw across the classroom. The speed with which Olivia Tartiflette caught it drew an approving nod. The pupils at the Assassins' Guild school were also used to their teachers throwing more lethal things at them than just the blackboard duster.

"Off you go then" Alice said, brightly. "Small Gods' Cemetery is nearest. Plenty of old things there to dig up!"

"But… they're _bodies_, miss!"

"Which you will be adding to in due course. Always provided you live to pass your Finals, of course! OK, so we're agreed archaeology isn't just about bodies and digging up old things. Anyone want to be more specific? Anyone?"

She nodded at Olivette. "Choose somebody. No, don't say their name out loud. Just throw the shovel. Well done, good starting contribution."

This time the shovel flew at Alexander Lavish. Taken off-guard, he fumbled it slightly, but recovered before it hit the floor. Alice glared at him.

"_Mr. Lavish! Wake UP! _Demerit point!"

The boy coloured, and scowled. _Idiot, _she thought. _Does he not realize that one day people might be aiming much worse things at him than a garden tool? _

"Your definition of archaeology, please? Come on, the class would like to hear."

"Digging up…old, _valuable _things, miss? Like _gold?"_

There was something in the lascivious way he said _gold _that made her fists tingle. She reminded herself that the whole Lavish family had that particular trait, but it didn't make it any better.

"Good. Let's take that line of thought to its logical conclusion. You have the shovel, Mr. Lavish. Now get to the Royal Bank, it's just down the road, and start digging for gold. I understand there's plenty in the vaults."

The classroom collapsed into laughter.

"_He'll be arrested, Miss!"_

"_Stealing without a Thieves' Guild licence. He'd better hope the Watch get him first!"_

"_The way I heard it, Miss, his whole family were stealing from the Bank and _**none** _of them have got thieves' licences!"_

Alice clapped her hands for silence, seeing Lavish's expression change from sullen to furious. Part of the art was reining it in, she told herself, to allow them a little joke at each other's expense but not to allow it to become bullying. And for them to know where the line was, even with a thing like Lavish.

"Well said, Mr Lavish. We've got as far as _"archaeology involves digging things up which may be old and may be of intrinsic value". _But that is by no means all and there is a lot more to add yet. Thank you for your contribution. Now as before, think of somebody in the classroom and throw them the shovel. In your own time, Mr Lavish."

Alice was prepared for what happened next. To shocked gasps from the pupils and squeals from the girls, she sensed the shovel being thrown, full force and with intent, straight back at her. Without looking round, she stepped to her left, judged the moment, and picked the tool out of the air at head-height. A swift twitch of her wrist turned it and sent it back in the direction from where it had come.

Alexander Lavish leapt out of his seat as the blade of the shovel dug deep into the wood of the desk-top, within inches of his body. Alice had spent _ages_ honing the edge of that blade to razor-sharpness and then disguising it with an application of paint and false rust. (She knew a third-year class would have the wit to know and the skills to deal with this – it was a fair test)

She stepped forward and locked her eyes with Lavish, lowering her glasses so he could see she was not amused.

"That was fair, Mr Lavish. I did tell you to choose anyone in the classroom, which by definition includes me. But let me offer a word of wisdom. If you _ever_ try a stunt like that in my classroom again, afterwards you will be assisted upstairs to see the Master to explain your actions. And other members of staff, such as your housemaster Mr Mericet, would not even give you a warning or a second chance. He would not deal with you as leniently as I am dealing with you now. Do we understand each other, Mr Lavish? Good. Now retrieve my shovel and bring it to me. Very carefully. I shall be watching you."

Alice felt that she would be spared further trials of her authority in the coming term: nobody gossips like school pupils. It wouldn't do her any harm in the staffroom, either. And _every_ teacher in the Guild would now be watching Lavish like a hawk.

Juliana Montefiore raised a hand, tentatively. Alice nodded, eager to get the lesson back on track.

"Miss, you were talking about robbing the Royal Bank being a kind of archaeology?" Juliana said.

Alice nodded: _not quite right, but she's trying. _

"And there's the Watch who will be trying to stop you. And if you haven't got a Thieves' Guild licence, then the Thieves will try to stop you. And the Patrician, if he caught you, would hang you."

Alice nodded.

Juliana, continued, hesitatingly, as if she were still working out the logic of it, "With all these people trying to stop you, Miss, is this where it becomes Stealth Archaeology?"

Alice beamed. "Now that was an _intelligent_ comment, Miss Montefiore. Excellent. Gold star and merit point, I think!" She paused, and then the shovel was in mid-air again. "Your turn with the shovel, I think!"


	2. Chapter 2

Having established a rapport with all but one of her class, and at least a cold, chilly, understanding with that one, and having worked out an accurate definition of the process and purpose of archaeology, she felt the class, even Lavish, deserved a gentler treatment in the last half-hour.

She laid the shovel alongside its companion pickaxe on the desk-top, and smiled.

"Even the best archaeologist comes to grief sometimes. You have all been told the greatest enemy of the Assassin is over-confidence? Let me explain how I learnt that lesson. It was a little over eleven years ago, in Lancre. And Lancre is? Miss Rust?"

"Lancre is an insignificant little so-called kingdom in the Ramtop Mountains, miss". Alice caught the malicious look she shot at Araminta Tockley, who she knew was a Lancre girl and to all intents and purposes a Scholarship pupil.

"Not _that_ insignificant. The University depends on it for supplies of octiron, which is mined there. Its coal fuels our city. Half our Wizards are from there. Captain Carrot of the Watch is a Lancre man. In many greater and smaller ways, we _need_ Lancre. Now, Miss Rust, name its current monarch."

Deborah Rust was unable to answer. Alice looked across the class.

"Miss Tockley?"

"King Verence the Second, miss".

"Good. His consort?"

"Queen Magrat."

"And the heir to the throne?"

"Princess Nottie, miss. That is, Princess Margaret Esmerelda Note Spelling".

"Thank you, Miss Tockley. Miss Rust, you know the standard assignment. An Assassin should be up to date, as far as is reasonably practical, on all Royal Houses, current monarchs, and lines of succession. You are evidently not. You will provide me, by five tomorrow, with a working plan for the inhumation of King Verence the Second. This is theory only, as I know no contract exists on him."

She smiled, noting Rust's icy killer glare, inwardly delighted by it, Alice moved on to telling her story. It had all begun when a twenty-one year old archaeologist, who thought she knew everything, had decided to spend a summer in the Kingdom of Lancre, mapping and exploring its archaeological potential.

As an undergraduate at the Quirm School of Archaeology, she had meticulously prepared a submission to her tutor, Professor Massingham-Montgomery-Bird, outlining the where, the when, and the why. He had studied it, raising an eyebrow quizzically.

"_Lancre?_ Are you _sure_, my dear?"

"Absolutely, sir. According to the records, nobody has even tried exploring or excavating there for nearly thirty years. The whole country is rich with Bronze and Iron Age barrows which have never been excavated. And there are stone circles too!"

"I see. And the fact that all this archaeological bounty exists, but remains largely untouched, that doesn't in itself say anything to you?"

"That unless somebody goes there and excavates, it's going to stay untouched?" had been Alice's best answer. Much later, she was to reflect that in its total obtuse inability to understand the point her teacher was trying to make, it had been worthy of Deborah Rust.

The Professor smiled an enigmatic little smile.

"Off you go then, my dear. I really do believe you are in an un-rivalled position to learn something of great importance about archaeological excavation in Lancre! Ask Mrs Hudson in the office for a claims form for your traveling expenses and stipend. Oh, and by the way, if you meet a Mrs Gytha Ogg in Lancre town, as I'm sure you will – remember me to her? She was… most helpful… when I visited thirty or more years ago. _Most_ helpful." Alice saw her tutor's eyes sink into a faraway reverie . He emerged, abruptly. "Off you go!"

As Alice left, she thought she heard a mutter of "Overconfident. It's a lesson we all have to learn." on the other side of the office door, but dismissed the thought.


	3. Chapter 3

The trip out to Lancre had been _almost _uneventful. Alice had latched on to a party of Dwarfs heading back into the Mountains, reasoning that if you were heading into bandit country, a dozen dwarfs would make as good an escort as any. For some reason, it had felt oddly _fitting_. Oh, there had been that ambush in the Rammerorks by old-time Gnolls, but it had served only to earn her the respect of her traveling companions. Gnolls, after all, were a life-form dwarfs hated second only after trolls, and a dozen axes assisted by Alice's shovel and pick had seen them off. _Mimbrenoso Gnolls__1_, she had thought, identifying the warpaint on the bodies. _The worst kind._ It had been fun, in a way: a light workout. The Gnoll war-chief had sneered derisively at what he thought was a frightened woman ineffectually poking a shovel at him, right up until the moment where she had screamed and half-swung, half-thrust, and he had discovered the cutting blade of the spade had been honed to razor-sharpness. His body, slow to pick up the message that he was dead, had run on for a few paces, while Alice had given in to a strange primal instinct, followed the parabola of the severed head, and swung her spade just so, overhand, so that the flat of the shovel blade met the head with a dull _thwackkk!, _propelling it over the top of a net being carried between two more Gnolls who were now approaching her more circumspectly.

The war-cry _Forty-love! _escaped her lips, and a little part of Alice was disappointed that the head had not been returned to her so that she could hit it back again. Dismissing the thought, she dropped the shovel, took her pick in both hands, and ran at the nearest half of the net-carrying couple, who sought to retreat, but only tangled himself in his own net. His struggles to free himself were ended only by his discovery that Alice kept the pickaxe point every bit as sharp as the shovel-blade.

And then it ended, with Alice wondering where all that stuff about _Forty-love_ had come from, and why it had been so vitally important to send the head _over _and not _into_ the net.2

The Dwarfs had gone straight on to Copperhead, while Alice led her pack-horse into Lancre town. She stabled the horses and negociated for a room at the local inn, The Goat and Compasses, where she exhaled, relaxed, and unpacked her copy of Birdwhistle to plan her itinery for the next few weeks. She decided to go down to the bar later and engage a few locals in conversation to see if they could add to any of the tales in Birdwhistle's book, or give any further information as to likely sites.

She felt as a woman traveling alone she was safe enough: her archaeological tools had traveled with her, together with her sword and the Hublandish double-recurved hunting-bow. The pistol crossbows were a courtesy detail, and there were other useful devices secreted about her person that would remain secret for now. Besides, the Dwarfs appeared in awe of her after the episode with the gnolls, and there was nobody like a thirsty Dwarf for spreading a reputation. She checked the edge on her spade: still sharp, although a day or two of using it for its proper purpose would soon dull it down. She smelt the air: she knew she was going to like it here.

1 On Roundworld, _**Mimbrenoso Apaches**_ practiced hospitality to travellers of the razor-and-red-hot-knife variety.

2 Tennis as we know it does not seem to be known on the Disc. Maybe Alice caught an inspiration particle at an otherwise inopportune time. She has a lot of the attributes of a Roundworld tennis player, after all.


	4. Chapter 4

Later that evening, after dinner taken in her room, she walked down to the bar. Conversation stopped, and she was aware that she was the object of curiosity. She asked for a dry sherry. The nearest Lancre yokel cleared his throat and said, nervously, "Seven gnolls and a werewolf, wasn't it, m'lady?"

"No werewolf. Just gnolls." she said, with a smile. _How rumour exaggerates things! _

She gave him a brief account of the skirmish in the Rammerorks and said, modestly, "The Dwarfs I was with got most of them. I really didn't have too much to do. But I have a few skills."

The local nodded, somberely.

"So what brings an Assassin to Lancre, ma'am?"

Alice was taken aback._ Just because I wear dark clothes and I can fight a bit, and I've never shied away from killing when there's no alternative…_

"We do have a King here. He might not be much cop, Verence, but he's still our King…"

"If I were here on a contract, would I be sitting in the pub making myself conspicuous?" She remembered what her older brother, who really _was_ a product of the Assassins' School, had said to her about Lancre: "Besides, there's no contract out on your King. Which suggests he's the kind of chap who hasn't made any enemies. Relax, I'm not here on a contract. MY speciality is archaeology. I'm just here to dig around a bit, that's all."

Alice became aware of an uneasy silence. For the first time, she noticed the small fat wrinkled woman sitting in state further down the bar. She _looked_ jovial enough, but some deeper sense warned Alice that this was not a woman who fooled easily nor took idiots gladly.

"So you're an archeolololologist, missy?" the old woman said, in a not-entirely-friendly voice. "Now _there's_ a thing. We ain't seen one of _them_ round these parts for, ooh, over thirty years!"

"That's what brought me here" Alice said, with perfect honesty. "I thought it was strange that somewhere so near had been overlooked for so long. So I asked if I could come out here and make a few exploratory digs, as the area seems so rich in sites."

"Rich. Yes." the old woman muttered, dubiously. "And you're going to set about them with a pick and shovel. That should be something to see!"

A muted snigger ran round the bar, but hushed quickly, The old woman signaled for fresh drinks. "And put one in milady's glass down there, would you?"

Alice sighed. This wasn't the sort of entrance she'd been expecting. It also appeared that while the old lady was there, none of the locals was willing to divulge anything about potential sites, so it was going to have to be Birdwhistle alone. _And what was it they weren't telling her? _

Alice spent a frustrating couple of hours talking to locals and trying to get leads. They were friendly enough, yes, but a close people. They seemed to appreciate the news she brought out of Ankh-Morpork and Quirm, in a distant detached sort of way, and in return she learnt something of the social structure and set-up of Lancre. She noticed after a while the old lady had gone: who was she? She asked, carefully. _Just Nanny, our village witch_, they said.

Eventually Alice went for an early night. _Busy day tomorrow. _

As she drifted off to sleep, she thought she could hear voices, on the cusp of hearing.

"_What do you make of her, Esme? That young baggage needs watchin!"_

"_You was right to come to me, Gytha. Too much book-learnin', not enough practical experience. She's clever, sure enough, and thinks she knows it all. That's always dangerous"._

"_Nice girl, deep down.. Nothing evil and she'll do more good than harm, Assassin or no!"_

"_But here and now, she's bloody dangerous. Imagine her diggin' round by the Dancers? Or the Long Man?"_

"The Dancers", thought Alice, sleepily. "Birdwhistle says they're an old stone circle, possibly from the earliest Druidic period, up on the moors not far from here. Mmmmmm, I'll start there…" and sleep took her.

Meanwhile, something else awoke. It sensed a mind it could use. It found Alice Band. It decided to bide its time and see if she came to the Dancers on the morrow.


	5. Chapter 5

Alice had had a frustrating morning. Early enthusiasm had been replaced with a feeling of _will this dratted thin drizzle never stop? _At least the mist was clearing and she could see in front of her: she'd had to abandon the idea of going up to the Dancers straight away because of the weather, and instead had settled on a fall-back plan, to investigate what Birdwhistle described as _a singular monolith, standing where three paths cross. _Then there had been some self-evident folklore about it seeking to evade any attempt to look directly on it, which was contrary to what everyone knew about stone: once you'd put it somewhere, it tended not to move around very much. A ten-foot monolith should advertise its presence, just by being there and ten foot-tall, for goodness sake!

She'd also had the uneasy feeling that she was being followed: her surface senses were telling her that she was as alone as she possibly could be, but the deep-down senses that had often saved her life as a solo adventurer in lonely places were working overtime and practically screaming at her.

Yet the only things she'd positively seen were that wretched grey tomcat which was for some reason stalking her, over in the long grass to the left, and occasionally meeting her eyes with more intelligence than she felt was _right _for a tomcat. She'd also glimpsed various creatures of forest and moor, never more than one at a time, that also seemed to be taking an interest. And just once, something above that in the mist had taken on the aspect of a large black bird… Alice had reflexively unslung her bow and nocked an arrow, thinking back to what she'd learnt in Überwald about wild banshees. The thing had pulled up and veered off sharply, with what seemed like a very un-Banshee like mutter of _Oh shit, she's armed! _

She kept the bow and a ready arrow in her left hand, just in case, although she hadn't seen it since. Focusing on the job in hand, she frowned. _Where in the seven Hells was that dratted monolith? _

She'd glimpsed it coming up the track, a tall pillar of rough-hewn bluestone, looking like Presley stone from out of Llamedos which she knew was not native here. She'd looked away to check the mounting suspicion she wasn't alone… and then it had gone! A faint shuffling nose behind her. She had whirled, nocking arrow to bow, but there was nothing there, save the sort of dragged-down sweeping wide curve in the grass that suggested something large and heavy had been dragged - or dragged itself – through the undergrowth. The trail had not been there seconds ago.

She heard a _gloop-gloop_ sound over in the marsh, and carefully went to check it. A trail of bubbles was rising from the muddily opaque waters, just where the trail of trampled-down vegetation led to the marsh edge. The last few feet into the water was just a vegetation-free mudslide. Alice took a deep breath, This was going to be a long morning.

"_What's she doing now, Granny?"_

_Granny Weatherwax shook herself properly Back and placed the _"I aten't Dead!"_ sign to one side. _

"_Tryin' to count the Stone" she said. "Should keep the girl busy all mornin'" she added, with a hint of malicious satisfaction. "Got that cup of tea ready, Magrat? That bloody animal of Gytha's had to stop off to kill somethin'. Couldn't hop over to that badger fast enough! Need to get the taste of fieldmouse out of my mouth"._

"_Did you see Nanny?"_

"_She's doin' aerial surveillance. Can't Borrow as well as I can, y'see. Damn girl scared her when she brought her bow out! Never seen Gytha move so quick on a broomstick!"_

_Magrat smiled and poured the tea. .The witches waited._

Exasperated, Alice reshouldered her pack and replaced her bow in the quick-release waterproof cover. Trying not to curse the waste of time, she re-checked her map co-ordinates and set off in the direction of the stone circle. _At least Birdwhistle says these things stay put. _she thought. _ He's quite emphatic about it, in fact. But who on Disc are the Gentry? _

_Nanny Ogg landed with a clatter and an "Oh, bugger!" She left the broomstick in neutral and ran to Granny's back door. _

"_Esme! That bloody girl's heading off down the Dancers!"_

"_Stay here, girl" Granny said, firmly. "Get the fishin'float down and tune in. Get some scryin' experience. If you sees any sort of trouble happenin', and you will _know_ when it does, get on your broomstick and put the alarm out to every witch you can find. Just tell 'em "breakthrough at the Dancers" and they'll know to get here as soon as."_

_Magrat heaved a deep sigh, and went to get the green glass fishing float Granny used in lieu of a proper crystal ball. Outside, two broomsticks rose, one with more reluctance than the other…_

Alice regarded the Dancers. The stone circle stood out in a flat area of moorland, even above the generally waist-level vegetation. She noticed that the area immediately around the Stones had been flattened, cut, and levelled down in a wide band for about five yards, and she wondered what the purpose of this was. It indicated that people came up here regularly, though.

She unshucked her pack and left it, alongside her pick and shovel, some fifteen yards from the nearest stone. She placed everything on the ground with exaggerated slow caution, as if reassuring some unseen observer that she wasn't a threat. Finally, she took several items from her bag and approached, assembling something made up largely of tubes as she walked.

Reaching the stone, she inserted the earpieces of the stethoscope and, seemingly at random, applied the sound receiver to a spot on the exterior of the stone. As she listened, she consulted a stopwatch. She repeated this in several places until she was satisfied. Finally she switched the thaumometer on and took a reading. _Just normal residual background magic. Good.. __1_

"_What's she _doin',_ Esme?"_

"_She's not entirely stupid, then. Some hope for the girl!"_

Alice again had the nagging feeling she wasn't alone, but ignored it. Well, at least she'd done the standard checks and she was ninety-five per cent certain it was only rock.. This was important. It was true to say that sleeping trolls should be left alone, as one thing they really hated was a prospecting Dwarf coming along and interrupting a deep inner dialogue on beauty and aesthetic by plunging a pickaxe into their earhole. For broadly similar reasons, sleeping trolls didn't think too kindly of any archaeologists in the vicinity, either. So it was vitally important to make sure that the apparently inert lump of stone in front of you was, in fact, inert stone and nothing else. It was one of the very first things taught at archaeology college, in fact. Look for vital signs, like breathing or heartbeat, however slow, and check for magic: it should be higher around a sleeping troll. If there's nothing there, you may go ahead with the pickaxe. _If only the Dwarfs used stethoscopes_, she thought_: it would have saved an awful lot of bother down the years. _

She retrieved her spade, and returned to the stone. To her consternation, what felt like an invisible hand threw her over to her right, nearer the stone. It appeared to be pulling at her spade. Surprised, she dug her heels in and resisted, but the inexorable force, whatever the damned hells it was, tugged harder, wrenching the spade out of her hands and slamming it blade-first against the face of the stone. The pressure lessened, and Alice sucked her stinging fingers, glad they hadn't been mashed between the handle and the stone.

She stepped back, aware the tug was still there, pulling at her upper arms and at her boot-tops: her mind raced quickly. _Whatever it is, is acting on metal. The larger the metal, the stronger the pull. The throwing knives I'm carrying aren't all that large or heavy. And they're not all made of steel. Is this to do with what Birdwhistle called the Gentry ?It'd be interesting to get a clue as to who or what they are. He wasn't specific at all! _She quickly removed the throwing-knife tucked discreetly into the top of each boot. Removing the ones on her arms would involve partially undressing, and this brought the possibility of hidden observers back to mind.

"_How many weapons is that bloody girl carrying!" exploded Gytha Ogg._

"_They're just decoration" said Granny Weatherwax, dismissively. "The most dangerous one is the one keeping her ears apart"._

_There was a pause._

"_And she'll be less dangerous when she's learnt how to use it properly! Didn't you hear, Gytha? She invoked THEM! HERE!"_

Alice now knew for sure she wasn't alone at the stones. Seemingly casually, she undid her cuffs and rolled her shirt-sleeves up She _flexed_ the muscles of her upper arm and shoulder in a special sequence. The short stabbing knife dropped out of its sheath and landed, hilt-first, in her hand. She held it reversed, the metal of the blade concealed by her fore-arm.

There was a mist forming inside the circle and she tasted snow on the breeze. In July? She half-glimpsed three figures in the mist, and fought a desire to run forward and meet them. One, smaller and slighter, stepped forwards.

_We've been watching you. _The words seemed to arrive straight inside Alice's head. _Alice Geraldine Band._

Despite herself, Alice looked. She blinked: quite possibly the most attractive woman she had ever seen was standing there. And dressed all in red leather. A second, shriller, voice arrived in Alice's head, sounding by comparison like the cackling of a raven: _Beware, girl! She gets into your head and takes the form that's most attractive to you!_

The leather angel wavered and disappeared.

_Did you like what you see? I can make it _real_ for you. You have a mind we can use in the world, Alice Band. We can make it worth your while. _

"No". Alice said, firmly. "I don't trust you".

_I see into your mind, Alice Band. Daughter of a priest. Youngest of five children. You always thought your brothers were allowed to lead more…interesting lives. You look at your older sister and you shudder. You resent the way that you were valued for nothing more than your worth as marriage fodder. Your own wishes and…inclinations… were swept aside. Remember…._

When she was sixteen, her father had started inviting promising young curates around to tea. High-flyers from the seminary, destined for great things. Bishop Band had dropped unsubtle hints about _daughters of marriageable age. _Alice had seen the trap and escaped.Her sister Sarah had given in. No wonder, she thought, remembering those stuffy suffocating Sunday teas after Evensong, her father had been so angry back at the Quirm School, when…

"Your Grace, I'm so sorry!" Miss Delcross had wailed. A fourteen-year old Alice had hung her head under her father's contemptuously angry glare.

"Is the girl to be expelled?"

"We do not believe her to be the instigator, Your Grace". Miss Butts had stated. "We have of course expelled the other girl…." Alice had burst into inconsolable tears. "as she was a year older and it may well have been the case that she coerced Alice into…the acts."

"_I didn't _need_ coercing, you pompous old trout!" _Alice had screamed, through her tears.

"Be SILENT, girl! Isn't it enough that you may have polluted yourself too badly for marriage?"

"Please, your Grace. Although we are always vigilant and we seek to prevent it, and we act swiftly when it is found, this is an institutional hazard in a girls' school. The gels form attachments and crushes, and while most of the time this is harmless , every so often it crosses the line into dangerously un-natural physical acts."

"You women need a chaplain. Someone to put the fear of the Gods into these girls."

"Perhaps so, Your Grace. You would be the best person for now, yourself and Lady Band, to take Alice in hand and look after her spiritual and moral welfare. But please don't be too hard on her. And we'll see her back at school at the start of next term?"

Having been found guilty of It, caught _in flagrante delicto_, in fact, in a mutually satisfying act of It with Caroline Bradwell, Alice had then endured a purgatory of sermons, cold baths, Temple attendance, and her father alternating freezing cold and scarifying anger at her.

_Didn't we raise you to be better than this! I'll tell you what your future is, my girl. I will in time choose you a good husband who one day might have potential to become a bishop himself, or higher, and you become his dutiful wife! The expensive education we are paying for you to have is to prepare you for life as a clergy wife, so that you do not disgrace your husband. It's not for you to enjoy, nor is it to give you big ideas as to what else _**you**_ might want to do. And any more of this un-Godly and self-polluting profanity with other girls, as if they could ever substitute for what a man can bring to the marriage bed, and I'll have it whipped out of you! Do you UNDERSTAND me?_

In the present, at the Lancre Dancers, Alice has slumped to her knees with the bitter memory.

The beautiful woman looking back at her from the other side of the Stones has put on an expression of concern and empathy. Alice realizes that this is not even skin-deep, and anger wells from the agonizing memory. _How dare she use my most private memories like this! _

_I can make it easier for you. _The siren-voice says, soothingly_. You live in a world where women who think like you do are considered perverts, freaks, monsters. You believe you walk alone and no-one understands you. You promised you would never cry again, not after Caroline was taken from you and your stern unyielding father tried to force you into a mould you are not meant to fit. You have unique strength. That called me. I can make things so much better for you, Alice Band. All you need to do in return is a little service for me. _

Alice hears the other distant voices in her head shrilling _No! It's a trap! Get away from this place NOW, girl!_

The leather angel shrugs.

_Crabbed and bitter old women who think they defend this place. Ignore them. Who knows, the bitch might have wondered, like you, when she was younger. But then old age took away the possibility, and she will die doubly virgin…_

_That don't account for __**me**__, you creature! _A third voice exploded. To Alice, it sounded oddly like the old woman in the pub. _You may be sure I lived my life, and while I never took the hard road young Alice is walking, don't think I didn't wonder about it a time or two!_

Alice wondered just how many people were jostling for space in her head. It felt like she was the battleground in a far older war. 

She stood up, free to choose, Alice Band again.

"I'm sorry" she said, replacing knives into her boot-tops.

"As far as I'm concerned you're all figments of my imagination, so kindly get out of my head NOW and leave me be. I'll just get my spade…"

A few seconds' exertion of force dragged the spade right over, so that the only part of the metal in contact with the strange stone was the narrow edge of the blade. She braced a foot on the stone, forced power into her thigh muscles, braced and pulled. The spade came free, tipping her on her back. She leapt to her feet again, hearing the malicious laughter of the woman in the ring.

_Your spade is what we need you for. All you need do is upset one of these stones, pull it out of place. Give us a Doorway, Alice Band… we will reward you. _

Alice knew, with sudden certainty, that this would be absolutely unwise.

"No." she said. She sensed two exhalations of relief from somewhere nearby.

_Or we can force you. You killed your parents, Alice Band, as surely as any Assassin. _

"No!"

_Your father died an Archbishop. He thought that was what he wanted. What he'd geared his entire life towards achieving. But when the final illness hit him, he realized how hollow it was. He repented over the way he'd treated you. He wanted to see you one last time, a daughter he realized he loved, to apologise. When it was clear you weren't coming, he died of a broken heart. And where were you on the night he died? Who were you with?_

"Nooo!" she screamed.

_And your mother, that timid downtrodden little mouse, didn't outlast him by very long. She blamed you for his death. For not accepting the station in life that was yours. For lacking humility."_

Alice felt tears running down her face. She screamed. " How dare you! How dare you use my parents, _who I loved_, as weapons against me!

_If you live, Alice, you will become a fully-fledged Assassin. The Guild will invite you to be one of its own. A fitting vocation for one who killed her parents and leaves Death wherever she goes._

Alice could see them clearly now, one either side of the…. Queen?...., lean sinewy warriors garbed in beads, feathers, and crude ornamentation, nocking stone-headed arrows of the sort she knew from a hundred digs as _elf-shot_.

_This will not kill you, It will show We are serious and bind you to Our will. It will, of course, _hurt.

_Thwock! Thwock! _ Expressions of wide-eyed surprise leapt to the faces of the two bow-weilding Elves, who toppled forward and dropped their bows. One had a throwing-knife embedded to the hilt into his left eye, the other through the centre of his forehead.

_How did you get iron past the stones? _The Elf-queen demanded, retreating into the ring.

Alice laughed. "Not iron, you foul thing. Do you think that's the only metal the Dwarfs mine? That was _**wolfram**__.__2__. And I've got more of it here!"_

The Queen receded still further_ "We may meet again, Alice Band". _

And she disappeared, with a mocking salute.

"_Esme, did you see that? She took out two of the buggers, one with each hand!" _

"_I seen it, Gytha. The danger that girl faces is that she could get to love killin' too much for its own sake"._

"_And them pictures we saw in her mind, the ones She was usin'! Can't blame that poor girl for bein' a wee bit mixed-up if that's the life she led."_

"_It's almost always the way, Gytha. There's as much to be pitied as scolded. And now we know more about our archaeology girl. _Now _what's she doin'…"_

Alice methodically tidied up the site, as a good archaeologist should. One of the dead Elves had fallen partway into the Lancre side of the circle. She took the opportunity to reclaim her knife, and taking care not to step inside, threw the dead Elf back behind one of the Stones where it was less likely to be seen from the Lancre side. Using her bow and a length of rope attached to an arrow, she dragged the other dead Elf out into Lancre, retrieved her knife, and set about taking iconographs from all angles. When she was finished, she took some of its body ornaments, wrapped them carefully in cloth, and put them in her pouch. Trying not to gag at the rank feral smell, this elf joined its fellow on its own side of the Stones. Alice took his bow and several arrows, again making sure these were wrapped and labeled.

Then she set off back for Lancre town, without a backward look.

_Ye Gods, I really, really, need a bath" _she thought. _But that will more than do for today._

Unheeded, the two witches followed.

1 Although if Alice had stepped inside the Dancers and took a reading from the _other_ side, she would have been surprised by several things, not the least of which would have been the thaumometer exploding.

2 Tungsten. One of the hardest metals known to Dwarf and Man. It is absolutely unmagnetic. Tungsten compounds are often used as "ceramic blades" for various purposes.


	6. Chapter 6

In another subjective _now_, the classroom was hushed, listening to a rather expurgated version of their teacher's story. Alice had edited out the fine detail: she was damned if she was giving the kids anything they could use against her.

"Elves are extremely dangerous" she repeated. "I knew nothing about them then, and that made it more dangerous still. Some of you may encounter them when you are out there working on a contract, and what is the third rule of the Concordat? Anyone?"

She went to the board and chalked up, under "ELVES", the old saw "Knowledge Dispels Fear".

"Elves are a magical creature. They have the power to reach into your head and read your deepest fears and your most private hopes. They will use both to enslave you and bind you to their will. I discovered in Lancre that iron, in all its forms, is the only defence and guard."

"They don't exist" sneered Deborah Rust. "Why are we wasting time discussing something that doesn't exist?"

"I wish I had your absolute certainty, Miss Rust. I bow to you for having such a solid, mature, appreciation of what is and what isn't, all by the age of thirteen. And for telling _me_, who was there, that I was very nearly inhumed by something that didn't exist. _Very _well done. And a sterling example of what we mean by over-confidence, by the way!"

Deborah Rust coloured. Alice went on: "Have those two iconographs got as far as Miss Rust yet? Please hasten them in her direction, if you please. Elves. Will extract from your head that which you most desire. Then they will use it as bait to steer you in their desired path. Mr Lavish, for example, might be offered gold in vast quantities. Miss Rust might be tempted with the idea that she will become the first female Patrician to rule this city."

Deborah Rust sat up with a start and looked at her teacher with sullen respect. _Bullseye, _thought Alice_. Of course the Rusts crave power and respect. They're just too stupid to get it and wouldn't have the first idea of how to use it if they did. You don't need to be a witch to work that out. _

"And that's where it begins. Your mind is not your own. It is under the control of another. And you have been inhumed, just as certainly as if it had been done with a knife or poison. Elves practice inhumation of the mind. Which is exactly why we should be aware that they exist and guard against them".

Araminta Tockley nodded, but said nothing.

"I might suggest that Elves would make an interesting study for the Teatime Prize. As far as I'm aware the topic hasn't been used before, and the judges would give credit for a new and fresh original submission. Perhaps a pupil planning the theoretical inhumation of the Queen of the Elves would win the prize this year, with the achievement earning their House some acclaim? Something for you to think about."

"And now for the moment where I take you all into my confidence and relate the painful and embarrassing way in which Lancre taught me the dangers of over-confidence. Miss Tockley, you might see the punchline sooner than the other pupils, so your silence would be appreciated? Thank you.

"It all started a day or two later, when I went into the Ramtops foothills to check the possibilities of the burial mounds there…"

It was a classic Bronze Age mound, Alice decided. A beauty. Untouched, allowed to grow over with bramble and furze and heather, its true nature concealed except to the eye of the archaeologist, its original purpose long lost in the mists of time. She walked around it, selecting her spot.

_They're normally built over a trilithon, which dictates the shape of the mound. Two upright roughly squared slabs, with another placed horizontally over the top, like an incomplete stone box. The dead King is laid to rest inside, with all the worldly chattels and wealth he needs to go into the next world with, and then earth is mounded over everything to make an artificial hillock._

Alice tilted her head to one side, rested her weight on her pickaxe, and stroked her jaw thoughtfully. It was two or three days on from the debacle at the Dancers: she'd stayed in her room reading Birdwhistle for much of that time, fighting off the ghosts of her childhood and adolescence that the Elf-Queen had raised. With the Elvish artifacts securely stowed in an iron-lined box – the old man had been deadly specific about that - she'd read everything Birdwhistle had written about the Gentry, no longer disposed to dismiss it as excitable folklore, accepting the possibility that in this weird country, his _**Antiquities **_described literal truth.

A nagging worry picked at her mind.

_The old burial mounds have their Guardians. Morality and Decency forbid that I should write more of Them, but it is that case that some Mounddes are warded by a terrible and implacable Keeper who will wreak vengeance upon those who seek to despoil them. _

Alice lifted the pickaxe, still bedeviled with the uneasy feeling that she was being watched. She suspected the little fat witch from Lancre village was tailing her: what she'd suspected to be a Banshee that first day, swooping down in the mist, also fitted the idea of a witch on a broomstick, now she'd had time to think it over. She sensed the witch nearby: but there was something else there, a hive-mind instinct. Bees? Better not smack the pick into a hive, then. OK, if I go in _here_, I'll find the edge of the trilithon upright, then careful excavation should get me inside the mound to catalogue what's inside…

She hefted, braced her legs, and swung… to her surprise, the blow never made it. The pickaxe appeared to fly out of her hands and disappear off on its own. There was a flash of blue, but she was unable to ponder its significance for very long as something, or an awful lot of small different somethings, crashed into her with a roar of noise. She made out a few individual words in the clamour:-

_Hey, Bigjobs!_

_Feegle wha'hey!_

_There can ounly be twa'thousand! _

_We're the wee boys and nae bother! _

_NacMacFeegle! _

_Ye frae the Corporation? Yon's oor HOOSE ye was startin' tae knock doon! _

_Bluidy bigjobs!_

_Bluidy Corporation! Tryin' tae evict us!_

Alice felt herself floating on her back, perhaps nine inches or so above ground level, with what felt like hundreds of little hands – little, very STRONG hands – holding her so firmly that she could barely move.

One of the things was standing in her chest, with a lot more _mass_ than a six-inch high blue sprite should have. It had red hair held back in pigtails, a villainous grin on its face, and was wearing nothing more than a soiled tartan wrap. As the noise subsided, the thing on her chest shouted

"Hey, fellas! Yon's a _guirly _bigjob!" and threw itself onto her left breast, exultantly shouting "Bouncy or whit!" Alice screamed and heaved, at both the shock and the absurdity of it. _Am I about to be sexually assaulted by a hundred or so very small… and very optimistic… six-inch high rapists? _

Another of the sprites stepped up onto her shoulder.

"Sorry, miss. Some o' they scunners have got no' the slightest idea of how tae behave tae a lady. If ye'll permit?"

Alice nodded, wide eyed. As the newcomer beckoned the sprite who was playing bouncy castles on her bosom, drew him over, then delivered an excruciatingly loud head butt.

"Ye dinna touch a lady in that way, ye puir durty-minded wee creature that ye are!"

"Sorry, Big Yan" said the one who'd been taking liberties, just before he keeled over backwards.

"Brought up in a midden, some ae 'em" said the Big Yan. Alice relaxed: she took stock, and realized there were quite a lot of parts of Alice Band that the little blue sprites were very conscientiously _not_ touching. As these coincided with the list of parts Alice Band reserved only for the touch of her very closest friends, and then only by invitation, she felt a little happier about this. It appeared to rule out one unpleasant possibility, anyway. But even allowing for the limited range of places the little blue men were holding her by, she was still stuck fast.

"Ye just tell me if my standing here on your shouder is taking liberties wi' your person, lassie" the spokes-sprite said, conversationally.

"Not at all. By comparison." Alice said, politely. "er… are you in charge here?"

"I'm the Kelda's man and Big Yan o' the clan, aye. They listen tae me."

"Well…er… can I go now?"

"Tell me your business first, aboot oor barrow. Ye was aboot tae start giein' it laldy and chopping great lumps oot o'oor wall. That whisnae _nice, _lassie"

"I'm an archaeologist" Alice said. "It's what I do."

At the mention of the word _archaeologist, _a great noise went up.

_Ark-ay-oh-lodgey! Yon's almost as bad as lawyerin'!_

_Worse! A lawyer might take your hoose away but only an archy ologist wuild knock it doon!_

_And they'd hiv yer gold and yer tresaurs! _

"_Lawyers?"_

"_And Archie Ollogists!"_

The Big Yan whistled backwards through his teeth. This to Alice was not good.

"Archaeologist, hey? We dinna see many of they around these parts! Aye well, we'll have to let ye go, lassie"

"Thank you." said Alice, heartfelt. "Look, I didn't know – ay didnae ken – it was where you lived."

"Aye, lassie. " said the Big Yan. "But just so ye ken the noo, and you can gang afley and tell all they other archaeologists tae no' bother calling on us wi' spades and pickaxes, we're _still_ gauin' tae throw ye intae the river first, before we let ye go. Nothin' personal, mind."

Alice felt herself moving horizontally and very quickly.

"_YIN! TAN! TETHERA! " _then she was in freefall. She landed with a loud, cold, splash, her head went under for a second, and then she was sitting up, dripping and coughing, trailing riverweed. The riverbank was crowded with little blue men, jeering and making rude gestures.

Two more splashes announced the arrival of her pick and shovel, which landed just near enough to splash her.

"_**Awright, ye wee schemies, ye've had your fun!"**_

The little blue men turned with alarm and obvious fear.

"_Waily, waily! 'Tis the hag! Waily!"_

"_Aw Goad! 'Tis the calleach herself!"_

The little fat woman from the pub came strolling up to the riverbank, Alice's pack nonchalantly slung from one shoulder. At the sight of Alice, she burst out laughing.

"Oh my… that's got to be the second-funniest thing I seen all week!"

Alice glared, but inwardly felt like she was going to burst into tears. _It was all going so wrong!_

"I rescued your pack, miss. Little devils was rootin' in it. They've had a bottle of medicinal alcohol, by the look of it, out your first-aid kit."

She extended a hand, and helped Alice upright. The sound of distant singing and fighting came from not far away.

"You'd better get your spade and pick and things, missy. Name's Gytha Ogg, by the way".

A memory was sparked in Alice. "You know my tutor. Professor Massingham-Montgomery-Bird. He asked to be remembered to you".

Mrs Ogg's face crinkled in a warm smile. "I remember. Monty Bird. Funny, that. I fished him out of _exactly_ this same stream thirty-odd years ago. And for the same reasons. He wouldn't be tole, neither, about the Feegle."

"He _knew_?" Alice blurted out. She felt a rivulet of water cascade down her leg.

"Come on, missy. Let's get you into a warm bath and them wet clothes dried before you catch your death."

Alice let herself be led. She reflected on exactly what her tutor had told her, with that strange faraway look on his face_. "Off you go then, my dear. I really do believe you are in an un-rivalled position to learn something of great importance about archaeological excavation in Lancre!" _

_And he wasn't kidding, either_. She squelched her way back to Lancre town.


	7. Chapter 7

And back in the subjective now, where a thirty-two year old Miss Alice Band finishes writing "PICTSIES" on the board, with a flourish.

"Pictsies. The Nac Mac Feegle. The Wee Free Men." she says, ticking the alternative names off on her fingers.

"A very real hazard when excavating in Lancre. So what do we know of them?"

Araminta Tockley raises a hand. Alice nods at her.

"The basic social unit is the Clan, miss. Each clan colonises a barrow and customizes it to its needs. The heart of the barrow is its Kelda, which is like its Queen. There is only ever one ruling Kelda, and all the males in the Clan, there may be up to a thousand of them, are either her sons or her brothers. They live by foraging and fighting, and will take animals either feral or farmed. They will sell their souls, if they had them, for alcohol, which they are only rarely able to get. Wise farmers, like my family, know this and bargain with them. In return for occasional bottles of strong drink, they may be persuaded to take only the old sick animals from a herd, and that by agreement. Their help may also be sought in a hard winter, when bears, wolves and foxes present more than usual danger to people and animals."

"Very good, miss Tockley. But I can't give a merit point, as it's from your own local custom and tradition, and knowing it implies no special virtue. Anyone else?"

Belinda Rhodri-Protheroe raised a hand.

"They're in Llamedos as well, miss" she said. "They tallk differently and they're more elusive, and some of the Families prefer green tribal paint, but they're recognisably the same creature. We call them the _tylwth- teg_."

"Spell that" Alice requested, chalking. "A Llamedosian word? Its meaning in Morporkian, please?"

"It's vernacular, miss. It means _Blloody Nuisance_. And they have a sort of llove-hate relationship with Druids. A Druid surveying a site for a new stone circlle must first make a service of dedication and protection, which involves sacrificing a case of whiskey on the site of the high Alltar. By morning, the drink is gone, but the stones are stillll standing, see. If he didn't leave the drink…"

"The stones would be unaccountably thrown down in the night as if by inexplicable occult forces. I get the picture".

"And sometimes if the Druid makes the right sort of bond, they hellp to erect the stones. My father told me the story of a tenant farmer on the estate, see, who got the idea he'd have a bigger field and less plloughing if he took the old mound and levelllled it fflat. You don't do that in Llamedos, miss.."

"_Miss Rust! Compose youself!" _Alice snapped; Deborah Rust was pretending to put up an imaginary umbrella in Belinda's direction. Her immediate cronies were giggling.

"WHY must peasants from Llamedos spit as much as they talk?" Deborah said, petulantly. Belinda glared at her.

_Will this girl live to see her Final Examination! _Alice wondered. _The way she's going on, she'll be inhumed long before that! And… better for Belinda that she attends extra classes in Elocution and Deportment, and learns to lose the Llamedosian accent that makes her stand out in what is laughably considered to be Polite Society. I'll talk to that frightful snob Mrs. Sanderson-Reeves about that. _

"Continue, Miss Rhodri-Protheroe." Alice sounded the _gHrr-Rhodd(h)ri _part with a perfect Llamedosian trill, glaring at the Rust girl. _What a language for spitting in. Almost as bad as Dwarvish. _

"Anyway, this farmer ignored the olld stories about interfering with the mound on his l … ground. He went out to l…knock it fl…raze it to the ground. They found him a day later, no clothes on and sitting on his pickaxe, you might say. Handle-first, see. "

"Ouch" said Alice, with sympathy. _They only threw me in the river. _

"And the mound where the _tylyth _live is still there, Untouched."

"I can't see what the problem is!" Deborah Rust declared. "On _my_ family estates, my father instructs the gamekeepers to deal with _vermin _by all means possible! And you can't tell me that these little blue…or _green_… creatures aren't just another sort of vermin! I bet they take game-birds!"

Alice smiled, without humour.

"And how does your father's estate staff deal with that which it terms _vermin_, miss Rust?"

"It's ever so easy! I helped with it last hols!"

_Yes, I bet you did, you vicious little brat. _

"What you do" Deborah was flushed with having the attention of the class, "is to block all but one of the entrances to the burrow. You then have this special apparatus, which cooks the chemicals at one end, in the burner. You then use a bellows to direct the poisonous smoke through a long hose into the burrow and they die. It takes longer for badgers and Daddy absolutely forbids using it on foxes, because of the hunting, but everything dies, even the small vermin like wasps. I experimented with some of the things we were learning about in Poisons last term, and watched the effects, and wrote it up. Mr Mericet gave me a highly commended for my summer essay! I bet those little blue men would all turn a more permanent shade of blue-green if the gassing apparatus was used on their dirty filthy little burrows!"

Alice contained her distaste. _I bet Mericet adores her. Still, let me carry on feeding her the rope and see if she hangs herself. _

The bell rang for the end of the lesson.

"_Do_ let us all know how you got on, Miss Rust" Alice said, dismissing the class. She tried not to notice the growing grin on Belinda Rhodri-Protheroe's face. "I'm sure we'll _all_ learn a lesson from your attempted inhumation of a Pictsie clan".


	8. Deborah versus the feegle

**The Lancre Caper – Epilogue**

I wasn't meaning to write this, as my preference at the end of "Lancre Caper" was to leave Deborah Rust's eventual fate mercifully undescribed – save that for annoying Feegles, it was likely to be painful and personally embarrassing. The details were to be left to the imagination.

But I've been asked for it, repeatedly and with emphasis, by many readers, including Fledge, Beka,Space Anjl, and others..... so who am I to be ungracious and not oblige.

Partly inspired by the current advertising campaign for Tango soft drinks. For those outside the UK. Tango do _very _unsubtle adverts. One of which had me laughing all the way home, so they deserve the plug here.

* * *

It was a pleasant early summer morning on the Rust estate, a patchwork of small farms either working for themselves and paying rent to the Lord, or else farming directly for Lord Rust's personal convenience. (Or at least, that of his estate manager: Lord Rust generally saw his country holdings only as a playground for huntin', shootin', and fishin'. The business of making money out of his tenant farmers and farm labourers he left to professionals).

. A group of estate hands were gathered around George Barford the gamekeeper. The meeting was as close as stolid country folk ever come to mutiny or rebellion against the Squire or his appointed representative: it was abundantly clear they were not happy, and they were beseeching George, one of their own in a position where he occasionally had Rust's ear, to do something about it. Their collective rumbling of discontent grew louder and more bucolic.

"Look, lads, I know how you feel." George pleaded. "I really do. She was a prize pain in the arse last summer and I know she annoyed a lot of people. But Young Lady Rust wants to spend a few days out in the country working with the Little People like she did last summer. I can't go to her dad and say "excuse me, Ronald. Your daughter's being a right royal little cow, and she ain't half pissing a lot of people off. If you don't watch out, they'll be hanging her by the heels from the nearest stout oak tree". It don't work, I tell you now! I'd be sacked and you'd all be evicted. We're expected to put up and shut up. I'm sorry, and yes Edward Grundy, I know you're steamin' with rage, but the least we can do is divert her. Find her something to do that she like and leave her too it, just draw straws like last year as to who baby-sits the little brat. Now I got the straws ready here, we'll _all_ pick, you first , Neil Carter, then you, Clive Horobin…"

And thus it was decided.

Young Lady Rust turned up at ten that morning, bright and keen, and because even the Rusts teach their children to behave with a modicum of surface civility to the lower orders** (1),** she immediately said "I want to go out poisoning vermin, Mr Barford, like last summer. How soon can we get going?"

_Well, that was safe enough, _Barford thought. _She learnt to use the apparatus last summer – perhaps a damn sight too enthusiastically - and only needed minimum supervision in the end. Hard luck on Mike Tucker, who drew the short straw, but that's life._

Barford had barely said "I'm sure we can accommodate you there, Miss Deborah"… when the bloody brat said something that took the smile right off his face.

"I know exactly what sort of vermin I'm looking for, Mr Barford!" she said, excitedly. "Now, Daddy said some sheep are being taken out towards Quirm Lane Bridge, but he's puzzled they're not being taken by foxes or wolves or other vermin. And hat you seemed reluctant to want to do anything about it, Mr Barford. Now when I was at school last term we had a jolly interesting lesson, for once, though I didn't realise how interesting it was going to be until later, and _I think I've worked it out!"_

Deborah almost bounced up and down in her excitement; George reflected that if she stopped scowling and learnt to smile with her eyes a bit more, she would actually be quite pretty. And her bouncing up and down like that, at the age of thirteen, was just reinforcing things… he put the uncomfortable thought out of his mind – he had daughters himself, and he din't trust some of the lads round here, not one _inch_. (_Ye gods, there's something else to watch for in the Rust girls as they get older. His Lordship ain't doing to thank me if his girl has a roll in the hay with a good-looking ploughboy! That Lucinda were a devil for that!)_

He forced his voice to stay level and unconcerned.

"And what did you learn at school that could solve the problem of the occasional missing sheep, miss Deborah? Sheep is tricky creatures, too stupid to realise they're in danger. They do stray and get lost now and again…"

"There's an old mound down there, isn't there? From the _really _old days. The kind that daft old people tell you in one breath there's buried treasure in, and in the next, they say it's no good going after it because the mound has terrible evil spirits in it who'll get you if you go anywhere near it with a spade, Well, mr Barford, that's where the _vermin _live who are taking the sheep and that's where we're going to gas them to death!"

Barford stepped back, trying not to show how aghast he was, and hoping his weatherbeaten face would hide how pale he'd suddenly become. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Mike Carter and Eddie Grundy exchange a consternated look, then nod at each other, while the normally bone-idle layabout Grundy took to his heels and moved faster than he'd done since Lord Rust had come this way, impressing people for heavy labour doing some essential road-mending for the estate.

_What are they teaching them these days? The gentry ain't meant to know these things, it upsets the entire social order if they gets to know to much! She knows enough to know something about the wee free men, but not enough to know they're evil little buggers if riled. Why does she think I let them take a sheep now and again? I_** knew**_ education for girls was a bad idea!_

"…and Miss Band, one of my teachers, a frightful jumped-up lower-middle class woman, said she'd annoyed a nest of these little blue vermin. She's a priest's daughter, of course, and she can't be blamed for her father being a sky-pilot, but it _does_ mean she's got her head in the clouds most of the time!"

"Er… miss… do you think this is a good idea?"

Deborah Rust turned the glacial blue family cold stare on him, as befits a lumpen prole who has dared contradict his social betters, and said

"Of _course_ it's a good idea_. I_ thought of it! Now fetch the gassing equipment! I've got some _super _poisons here!"

"George Barford sighed, deeply, and perfunctorily touched his forelock.

"As you wish, miss Deborah."

He turned and issued an instruction to Mike Carter. Out of the corner of his mouth, he added "Go slowly. I think I know where Eddie's gone. Give him time to get there and warn 'em before Madam arrives."

* * *

Eddie Grundy paused only to duck inside his cottage and grab a bottle. His wife Clarrie accosted him in the hall.

"Are you drinking _already_, at _this_ hour of the morning, Edward Grundy!"

"Leave me be, woman, there's a crisis on! Deborah Rust is in town, for one thing! "

Clarrie paused.

"You'd better pour me a glass, then." She said.

"And she wants to gas vermin in the old mound at Quirm Bridge!"

"Better make it a _big_ glass, Eddie!"

Eddie sighed, and brought out a second bottle of Bearhugger's finest. The one he'd been hoping to save until Soul Cake day. But if the alternative were to have…_them_…. getting pissed off and taking out their displeasure on the village… he slipped out and ran again, down towards Quirm Road.

* * *

"Are we ready? Good-oh. Let's go! Chop-chop!"

_Really, _thought Deborah_, contentedly, the peasants aren't all _that_ stupid and slow as long as you give them simple, clear, instructions._

And a little procession marched off, consisting of Deborah Rust, follwed by a glum-looking George Barford, followed by Mike Carter and Roy Tucker, with the handcart carrying the Equipment. Neither Mike nor Roy looked happy at all, but they'd drawn the short straws. They knew the Duty.

* * *

Eddie Grundy arrived, panting and breathless, at the old fairy mound. Anyone meeting Eddie would see a plump, cunning-looking, peasant who they suspected would know how to duck and dive and connive and avoid, where possible, a honest day's work. This was broadly correct, but deep down in there, especially when under stress, was a normally under-used brain that could accomplish surprisingly complex things. And he was about to do one such.

Walking up to the mound, but very carefully not stepping onto it, he stood in the silence of the day, seemingly alone, as birds sang and insects buzzed in the growing heat of the day. He raised the bottle of Bearhuggers and waved it in the air, as if trying to attract attention.

Suddenly, there was a change in the quality of the seeming solitude, as if he was looking into the Void that wizards go on about, and the Void had decided to take a personal interest in _him_. He swallowed, nervously.

"I've come from George Barford" he said. "You know him. George would have come here himself, he usually does the talking with you, but he can't make it today. So he sent me. He needs to get a message to you. Listen."

"_Dinna turn round, laddie" _a voice came, from grassroots level. "_We're listenin'_."

"This is important. You know Lord Rust, cold bastard, colder than an Ice-Giant's left nadger, thinks he owns all the land round here? Well, his daughter's in town. Vicious evil little brat."

"_We ken Rust, aye. Him an' his gets. We ran the son af of our land before now. Wi'oot his troosers."_

"I remember. But this is Deborah. She was round here last summer gassing things."

"_We recall. Big Tam and Daft Boab brought a badger back. If it wisnae for the kelda an' her wisdom, we'd have etten it. She tried it oot oan a stoat. It heeled over and died efter the first bite. Enough poison for to keel all of us."_

"That's what she wants to do. Like poisoning badgers in their sett. Only to you. You're in trouble."

There was a sudden chill silence. Eddie felt sweat running down his back. Cold sweat.

Then a sudden roar of rage, as of many voices, rolled up from the earth, Eddie wanted to run, but his feet were suddenly rooted.

"_WE'RE in trouble? Ye wouldnae care tae rephrase that, would yiz, mister Grundy?"_

"Trouble is on its way. Mr Barford asks you. The men with her are not there of their own will. If a Rust tells you to do something, you do it, or you lose your house and your land and your livelihood. He asks you to leave them be. On his honour. He also asks that when you punish the girl, not to kill her or damage her permanently. Just scare her. Teach her a lesson. It's a lot to ask as she wants to kill you. But if she gets damaged, Lord Rust damages us in return."

"_Whit's your price?"_

Eddie deliberately set the bottle of Bearhuggers in the ground and stepped back from it. There was a sensation of a certain thawing of diplomatic relations.

_Aye. That, and a ship-beastie, will do nicely."_

"I'll get Mr Barford to arrange you a sheep."

A blue flash zipped past, like a bargain-basement slightly soiled kingfisher, and the whiskey was gone.

"_Aff ye gang, then, mister Grundy. We'll sort things oot frae here, dinna ye fret!"_

Eddie ran, hearing behind him:

"_Pit that DOON, ye thieven' wee scunner ye! That's for EFTER, ye shilpit wee nyaff, ye! I dinna ken if ye've noticed, but we have a problem tae sairt oot! And we sairt it oot SOBER, de ye hear me?Hands aff the poteen!"_

* * *

Deborah Rust prepared the equipment in the lee of the mound, excitedly explaining all the things she'd learnt in poisons class from Mericet last term. Mike and Roy, having been tipped of by a nod from Eddie Grundy, stood respectfully a little way off, prepared to run at an instant's notice. George Barford stood a little way off, partly concealed in the trees and undergrowth, smoking his pipe. Lucinda nodded, and went forward to insert the nozzle of the apparatus into a handy rabbit-hole that, from the class description, looked about right.

She wasn't completely stupid: she'd registered the tell-tale signs of Feegle habitation, such as rabbit-holes that looked well-used but with no sign of rabbits. In fact, no small animals that could be confused with food lived in Feegle mounds. The sensible ones moved out very quickly, and the unwary ones got eaten.

Up in the summer sky, a buzzard called. George Barford, recognising a predator on game-birds, reflexively raised his crossbow, then thought better of it. Lord Rust shouted at him for not doing enough to keep down birds of prey. It was no use trying to tell him that there were such things as _morags, _birds of prey used by Feegles for flying and scouting. Shoot one of those and an aggrieved pilot was likely to land on you – heavily - from a great height, demanding to know if you knew how long it takes tae train one of those, ye trigger-happy bigjob ye, ye have to stairt frae the _eigg! _No, George allowed them an acceptable wastage rate of young pheasants. It was easier that way. He sighed. Being a gamekeeper in Feegle territory was not easy.

Something was happening… his ears.

Deborah was suddenly rolling on the grass and screaming, holding her ears. There was just a hint of sound, way up in the high-pitched register… George had heard that younger people had far higher hearing sensitivity in the high registers. Deborah was thirteen, wasn't she? He heard Mike and Roy shout and run. He felt the earwax shift, melt and run.

_Great gods, that little Feegle… the gonnagle, isn't he? Playing the…mousepipes… within inches of Deborah's ears. No wonder she's writhing on the ground like that… ah. Here they come. _

A swirling shouting crowd of Feegle appeared from every exit point the mound offered. Hundreds, well over a thousand, George estimated. Deborah was swept up and brought down on her back. George watched as she was tied to firmly driven stakes at both wrists and ankles. The blue tide then formed a milling jeering circle around her, apart from a smaller sub-group that went to investigate the gassing apparatus.

"Morning, mister Barford!" one of them called to him, raising a thumb. George nodded acknowledgement, and watched as they set about working the apparatus out.

"Aye, serve her richt if we stick it up her wee pink bum and poomp the bellows, know what I mean?"

"We cannae do that, Wee Psychotic Jock" another one said. "We promised Mr Barford, ye ken? Through his man Grundy. Not tae kill or damage the girl. The Big Yin agreed".

"But we can pit the girl tae inconvenience, aye! . The Big Yin tellt us tae see if we can empty this thing, and sairt of refill it. Hey, Mr Barford, whit's the best way?"

George considered, and said: "Point it downwind so the breeze disperses it. Kill the fire in the boiler. Then pump the bellows till it's empty, taking great care not to breathe the fumes. Then it's best washed out after."

"Cheers, Mister Barford, yiz is a guid man for a bigjob!"

George was not a vindictive or unreasonable man: informally, he was the nearest thing the village of Quirmbridge and its environs had to a Town Watch, and he knew how to handle people. He nodded to the Feegle.

"Do me a favour, would you. Put a gag on her, so if – when – her father asks, I can say I was on the other side of the estate and didn't hear her calling for help. Oh, and it's shaping for a hot day. If you're going to keep her for any length of time to teach her a well-deserved lesson **(2),** give her some water now and again? Thank you."

One of the Feegle went off to relay the request; George saw the Big Yan look his way and raise a thumb in agreement. The rest set about making safe and dismantling the poison apparatus.

George nodded. The Feegle, when you got to know them, might be dirty, disreputable, and capable of stealing everything not actually secured by very heavy steel bolts to ten feet of concrete underpinning. But when they entered into an agreement as between equals, they were the most reliable people on the Disc. Vaguely, he wondered what they were going to refill the gassing machine _with._ Well, he'd see… he reached into his satchel for the sandwiches Mrs Barford had prepared, and settled down for a long wait.

* * *

Deborah Rust looked up through frightened eyes at the little blue man, indescribably smelly and ugly, that stood silently on her upper chest, looking down at her. Is this how Miss Band had felt all those years ago? But she was fairly sure Miss Band had not been staked out over what felt like a very restless anthill. She could feel _things _crawling inside her clothes. And – yecch, how gross! -she could see _right_ up the little blue man's kilt. Was this part of the terrible retribution?

"That wisnae nice, lassie" the blue man said, shaking his head. "that wisnae nice _at all_. If ye was an_ archie ollolologist, _at least ye'd have had an excuse, ye ken whit I mean? We'd still no' have appreciated it, but it least you'd have had an explanation."

He paused, shaking his head again.

"We ken your family, lassie. Awfu' people. People round here are too frightened to dae anything because they're scared of your feyther. From whit I hear, wi' good reason. Cross him and he takes _everything_ from you. Now that's no way to live. No way _at all_."

_Nae laird! Nae quin! Nae master! Nae laird! Nae quin! Nae master! Nae laird! Nae quin! Nae master! _

The chant went up from the Feegle horde crowding all around her, rising in volume, in anger, in pride, with much shaking of weapons.

"And your feyther is nae _oor_ Laird!" the Big Yan shouted. "Is that why he sent yiz here tae kill us? Like sae many meece-beasties in a burrow? Did he think we wiz wee, sleekit, timorous and cowerrin, or something? WE ARE NOT! WE ARE NAC MAC FEEGLE!"

Again the chant ran round the throng. Deborah felt a rare and strange emotion for a Rust.

Fear.

"We have something planned for ye. Jist lately, we've been living a high-fibre high carbo-thingy diet wi' plenty of starch in it, aye. The first summer vegetables, ye ken, and a Kelda who makes us eat them because they're guid for us. It all his to gae somewhere. We've been storing something up for ye in yon poison-bottle of yours. A bit of an acrobatic feat , aye, but we're managin' and there's a thousand of us. It'll take a little while, but you're no' goin' anywhere in a hurry."

He nodded, and jumped down. Deborah was let in relative peace for a while, and at one point the gag was eased and a stream of water was inexpertly slopped in her mouth and nostrils, She heard voices in the distance, comments like

_Name o'the Goads, Daft Boab! That wiz sick! Whit have ye been eatin?_

_Aye weel. She'll smell _that_ one! _

_Better oot than in, Big Yan!_

Deborah was aware of a new thing happening. A solid phalanx of Feegle marched up to her and stopped. Their ranks unfolded to reveal a different kind of Feegle. Slightly taller, with curves rather than angles, and a bulbous midriff signifying…

"_Look at me, girl!" _The voice had harmonics and tones that made it hard to disobey. It carried only a residual hint of the harsh accent of the males, but had a lilt and a beat to it that put it into the same geographical area. Deborah looked, vaguely recalling Herr von Graumunchen talking about _the loosely-grouped regional accents to be found out beyond Llamedos, in the wild highlands inland from coastal Hergen..._

"_I am Kelda. I am mother of this clan." _The look in the sprite-woman's eyes combined anger with motherly compassion.

"_You tried to kill my children. You were acting from fear and spite and malice. The mother in me would happily see you dead in your turn, as a danger to my folk"_

Deborah' eyes widened.

"_But the mother in me knows you too have a mother, and she would grieve for your passing. Killing you would not make things right. It would create a new grievance and offer your father ,the enemy of this land, fresh reason to come back and kill us, as if we were vermin. I have not that right. Therefore I have forbidden my brothers and sons from killing you. They are wild, they are fighters, but they are not murderers. Luckily for you, they are just. _

_" You must return to your people and find your own redemption, Deborah Rust. The wind whispers that you are shallow, violent, vindictive, bitter and twisted. But you must have a chance to find your redemption. And who knows, your children might turn out to be decent human beings. Killing you would take away their potential. And you may even listen to Alice Band when she talks to you about respect and compassion and all the things which are foreign to your nature as it is now."_

The Kelda, stately, turned to go.

"_I have seen. I believe I have understood. My brothers and sons now have one of their rather coarse, silly, crude, pranks to play on you. But they will let you go afterwards. Learn from your humiliation. Learn humility, Deborah Rust."_

The Kelda left. Then the rst of the Feegle returned with the poison gun and pumping apparatus.

"Ready fellas? Yin! Tan! Tethera!"

A well-oiled Feegle team started to work the bellows. Deborah's eyes widened in fear as the nozzle was held close to her face.

Then the foul, noxious, gust hit her full-on. She gagged and retched and writhed at her bonds.

Essentially, it was the bottled essence of a thousand Feegle farts.

Eventually, they cut the bonds and let her go. Then she was alone outside the mound, throwing up and coughing and crying.

After a decent interval, George Barford appeared.

"Come on, miss." He said, gently. "Let's get this stuff on the cart and get you home".

For once, Deborah Rust went quietly and meekly.

George Barford nodded at the mound. It had been a good day after all.

* * *

"Right! Settle down!"

Miss Band welcomed the class to a new year at the Assassins' School, and repeated he usual platitudes, which are expected ov even the best teachers at he start of term, about it being a new year, a new start, and an opportunity to build and develop on what we learnt last year.

"And now could I have your essays on the theme of _What I did in the Summer Holiday,_ please? And I'm _especially_ looking forward to reading yours, Miss Rust!"

Deborah Rust smiled weakly and added her essay to the pile… she had considered lying and making it up. But after some unaccustomed thought, she'd realised that it wouldn't do. Not with Miss Band. So she'd written the searing embarrassing scarifying truth, adding a plea at the end, _please, please, please don't make me read this out in class! _

* * *

Alice Band finished Deborah's essay and smiled. Maybe there was some hope for the girl after all... She paused, and graded it A+.

* * *

**(1)** Or at least, the better-educated and slightly brighter ones who could be relied on, and paid slightly more, to keep the herd in order, like factory foremen, farm managers, senior servants, and gamekeepers.

**(2)** At one time or another, George had longed to up-end _**all**_ the Rust children, and administer a much-needed physical chastisement. Only fear of sacking and eviction had made him restrain his big right hand, but it still itched to slap.

**Author's Afternote: **

Yes. I know. I freely admit pinching the minor characters names from long-running BBC radio soap opera set in carrot-crunching rural England, **_The Archers_**. It seemed fitting, somehow, as there is, among other things, a very Rust-like family called the Aldridges who own too much land and treat the peasants like feudal serfs.


End file.
